Fasting in Pre-Islamic Arabia

Your question below is a key issue to our discussion, but I don't think you realize or fully appreciate what you are doing.

Now, how can you prove that "Ramadan", in its Qur'anic context, is not the name of a specific month?

Whatever difficulty I may have of proving from The Quran alone that Ramadan is not the name of a specific month is the same difficulty of proving (again, through The Quran alone) that it is the name of a specific month.

The difference is that you have been taught through sources outside of and contrary to The Quran Ramadan is the name of a specific month and you have "Accepted" that teaching from the N2I scholars and because you have, that makes my job of convincing you otherwise all the more difficult, NOT because I don't a strong foundation for my argument but because the idea that it is the name of a month has been thoroughly ingrained in your mind and the minds of millions of other people which will make it appear to be true.

But that is not a big issue for me because as I said in my last reply to Mr. Noman Waseem, the validity or invalidity of Ramadan being the name of a month is not the strength of my argument against fasting anyway. My argument against fasting does not rest on Ramadan being a proper name or not. The strength of my argument rests on the actual definition of Saum, the fact that no one in the N2I world has become a Muttaqee from engaging in this religious ritual, the issue of Maryam in 19:24-26, the fact that "Kul" and "Ashrab" are both used in The Quran to mean other than eating and drinking, the fact that no one can "Witness" a month (which I personally believe is good enough to prove that Ramadan is not a month in 2:185), the fact that we are told whoever "witnesses" it Falyasumhu which means he should restrain IT (that is, Shahru Ramadan) and not restrain or abstain In It or Part of It or whatever. I believe this too is a strong argument against the idea of Ramadan being the name of a month in 2:185. Also, the fact that the imperative "Laa Kuloo" is absent in 2:187 even though it does appear in 6:121. If it is easy, simple and straightforward to say in 6:121, then it would have been even more direct and straightforward to say so in 2:187 since Saum does not mean abstinence from food and drink by definition.

These are issues I have raised and they have so far gone unattended to and I have my suspicions as to why they have been ignored and not answered.